


As The Light Fades

by yuuki



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Family Feels, Fluff, I call Keith's weird space wolf Yura, Langst, Lots of time skips, M/M, Post Season 6, bed sharing (very minimal though), hint at sexual content, klance, like you could just chalk it up to more bedsharing, no ACTUAL sexual content though, pining lance, slightly out of character Lance, so there are spoilers if you haven't watched all of season six yet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-16
Updated: 2018-06-16
Packaged: 2019-05-24 01:06:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14944766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuuki/pseuds/yuuki
Summary: They were going home.They were going home, and Lance could see his family again. He could finally get away from this mess of a war.He could live.Except, as it turns out, he doesn't really want to live without Keith.





	As The Light Fades

**Author's Note:**

> You know that weird ass space wolf Krolia and Keith find? Yup, I'm calling it Yura since the writers of the show couldn't be bothers to give the wolf a name

_We’re going home._

He could cry. Those words were the ones he’d been waiting to hear since he first set foot into outer space, and now, after who knows how long, he got them.

He was already tearing up from Shiro’s odd return, so what was a few more tears?

“Uh… Lance? You good?” Hunk asked, smacking his shoulder.

Lance swallowed and nodded. He had somehow fallen to his knees, and he quickly stood up. Romelle was giving him a weird look, but the others just gave him sympathetic looks.

“You must be excited,” Pidge said, giving him a smile. She adjusted her glasses before continuing. “After all, you were the most homesick out of all of us.”

Lance just nodded again, not trusting his voice. His throat still ached with the threat of oncoming sobs.

Krolia came forward to stand next to her son, her clawed hand resting on his shoulder. No one talked about the fact that Keith now had a facial marking identical to hers, but no one talked about how he was much taller and older looking now. His shoulders were broader and his hair was longer, and his jawline was more defined. Lance didn’t know what he got up to in the Blade of Marmalade, but it really helped his physique. He couldn’t decide if he liked it or not. Now Keith was an inch taller than him and much more muscular, and he acted and seemed older, too. The Inner Gay Lance loved this, while the Petty and Sad Lance was bitter about no longer being the tallest paladin after Shiro.

“I look forward to journeying back to earth,” Krolia said, the cosmic wolf she and Keith picked up from Romelle’s planet sniffing at her feet. “It will be nice to see the desert again. You, red Paladin. You have family there?”

“I- yes,” Lance started, rubbing at his eyes. “In Cuba. I have a mom, two brothers, Luis and Marco, and a sister, Veronica.”

Krolia looked like she was about to ask something more, but she shut her mouth hesitantly. Lance was glad; he didn’t mind when people asked him about his family, but their first set of questions usually led to the inevitable _what about your father?_

Keith cleared his throat. “I’m sorry to say, Lance, but we won’t be going to Cuba. We have to find Pidge’s dad to rebuild the Castle of Lions.”

“Oh, yeah, no, I know,” Lance said, feeling after wave of grief crash down on him.

Shiro smiled. “Maybe we can find room to stop by and see your family, Lance,” he said. “I’ve always wanted to see Cuba, anyway. Now, can someone please explain what’s going on?”

Lance smiled at him. Shiro’s words didn’t make him feel much better, but he appreciated the effort.

Keith stood up slowly, helping Shiro sit up on his own. “Okay,” he said. “We better get going. Who knows how far we are from earth now, and we can’t use the princess’s power to wormhole there anymore. “Mom, Shiro, you’re flying with me. Romelle and Coran, you’re with Allura. We’ll fly in the form of Voltron to make sure none of us get separated, and so we can take breaks and just go on autopilot if we get tired.”

Everyone murmured their consent and headed to their Lions. Lance paused, watching Keith and Krolia help Shiro to his feet. Shiro said something that sounded like “you’ve gotten so big, Keith. You’ve become a great leader, too.” Keith just smiled at him, pulling his remaining arm around his broad shoulders. Lance quickly looked away, feeling like he was intruding.

“Don’t worry,” Allura said, resting her hand on his shoulder. “Shiro will be fine.”

Lance didn’t have the courage to tell her it wasn’t Shiro he was thinking about.

 

\----  


“Shiro, this whole ‘I have white hair just like an Altean’ thing really isn’t working out for me. Please dye your hair and your eyebrows too, while you’re at it.”

Lance sighed and closed his eyes, tuning out the voices of his companions. They were stopped on some planet called R’xla to gather more supplies and rest. Currently they were in the R’xlan equivalent of a hotel, and R’xlans kept coming over to make sure they were alright.

“You okay?”

That wasn’t the throaty voice of a R’xlan. Lance opened an eye, fixing his emotionless gaze on Keith’s concerned face. He closed his eye again. “Just fine,” he told the former red Paladin.

Keith didn’t say anything, just sighed and sat down next to Lance. He still found this whole thing weird; Keith being back with his mother and a sassy blonde Allura and a blue wolf that looked like a thirteen year old’s fursona. At least Keith’s random bouts of anger weren’t gone, if the way he acted towards Lance when he returned was anything to go by.

It was a weird and tense silence. Keith wouldn’t stop fidgeting beside him, and Lance could almost imagine the painfully awkward look on his face even with his eyes closed. He felt more than heard Keith sigh, then he felt Keith move to get up.

Lance opened his eyes, not wanting Keith to leave. “You-”

Keith paused, turning to look at Lance. “Me?”

Lance swallowed twice before he nodded. “Yeah, you- uh, you look good. Bigger. Older.”

Keith gave him one of those soft smiles and _fuck,_ Lance wished it was him stuck in the quintessence field instead of Lotor. “Yeah, Mom and I got stuck on this weird star whale for two years. That’s where we found Yura,” Lance didn’t know who Yura was, but he was going to assume it was the space wolf.

“Keith, buddy, two years haven’t even passed.”

Keith smiled. “I know. Not out here, they haven’t. But in the place Mom and I went to, time and space doesn’t exist like it does here. Time is just a relative concept, Lance. Two years there is like two weeks here.”

Well, that explained why Keith and Krolia were so close. They had two years to get to know each other. Lance had been curious about their relationship since they first showed up. If his father randomly showed up after years of being gone, Lance wouldn’t be so buddy-buddy with him. He’d kick him.

Keith apparently took Lance’s silence as the end of the conversation, and he moved to get up again. Lance waited until he was a safe distance away before he whispered the words “I missed you,” to Keith’s retreating back.

Maybe it was Keith’s newfound superhuman cat alien hearing, but he froze, not even moving to breathe. After a second, his breathing returned. He turned his head ever so slightly to the side, and Lance could see the edge of his smile. Lance sat a little straighter, his breath leaving him. “Yeah. I missed you too, Lance.”

Lance wished he was anyone but himself. Maybe then he'd have a chance.

  
\----

 

Lance stared at Coran, not fully processing his words.

They were using yet another planet as a rest stop, but the only hotel-like building around had been a small inn with ten rooms, five of which were taken.

That left five rooms to the five Paladins plus five friends, if you counted the wolf. Which, for some reason, they did.

Romelle was to room with Allura, which was no surprise. Pidge was with Hunk (they had argued to be partnered with each other so they could build a robot all night long), Shiro was with Coran (in case he need medical attention in the middle of the night, and Coran was the only person with medical knowledge other than Allura who was roomed with Romelle. He apparently found Coran’s incessant chattering favorable over death), and Krolia took Yura.

Which left Lance with Keith. It made no sense. Really, why not put Keith with Shiro, Krolia, or Yura? At least he _liked_ them. Lance wouldn’t even mind bunking with Krolia or Yura. He’d take anyone over Keith.

“Got it?” Coran asked, and everyone scattered to their rooms, leaving Keith and Lance alone.

“Are you okay?” Keith asked after a couple minutes of them standing in silence. “You’ve been spacing out since Coran announced the room pairs. Do you want me to switch, or something? I’m sure Shiro won’t mind sleeping with me.”

Lance jumped, startled out of his sad reverie by the thought of listening to Coran’s reminiscing about Altea all night long. That, and Keith’s last sentence and the way he phrased it. He shuddered to shake those vulgar thoughts out of his head. He was _not_ thinking about Keith naked, nope.

Oh, fuck. Not thinking about Keith naked made him think about not thinking about it, and now he was thinking about Keith naked. “No, it’s fine. Let’s just get to the room,” he said after a considerable amount of silence. Keith made a noise of agreement and they stepped into their room.

It was a nice room, with a good amount of space. The bathroom was tucked away, and there was a little closet for them to store their things. The only problem was that there was one bed.

Keith and Lance stared at it for a couple seconds before Keith turned his slightly annoyed gaze to Lance. “Well, it’s a king,” he said. “We should be able to share it, no problem.”

Lance sighed, knowing the others wouldn’t have this problem. Pidge and Hunk were probably huddled together on their bed as they worked on their robot while Shiro probably held a pillow over his head with his one arm to block out Coran’s voice.

“Yeah, no problem,” Lance repeated before he stripped out of his clothes so that he was left in his t-shirt and boxers. He thought about taking his shirt off too, but decided against it. He didn’t want Manly Muscular Keith to see how skinny he was. He crawled under the covers and turned to look at Keith, who was watching him with wide eyes. “Well?” Lance prompted, squirming under Keith’ gaze. “You coming, or what?”

“Y-yeah,” Keith stuttered before he quickly undressed, wrestling his jeans away from him as if it had done him a personal wrong. Lance tried his best not to find it utterly adorable. He failed.

He also failed to keep his breath from hitching when Keith ripped his shirt over his shoulders, his lean muscles rippling under his skin. Keith paused for a fraction of a second when he heard this before he resumed his actions. “Can I turn off the light now?” he asked, his back still to Lance.

“Yeah. Yeah. Yup.”

Keith snorted before he clicked off the bedside table. He shuffled under the covers, his breathing coming a little quicker than before. Lance briefly wished this was a smaller bed so he could feel Keith’s body heat before he pushed those thoughts away.

“Goodnight,” Keith said, still wiggling. Lance wondered what had him all worked up.

“Goodnight,” he said in reply. Eventually Keith’s breathing evened out and Lance knew he had fallen asleep, but Lance himself was still a long ways away from it.

He didn’t know how he’d go back to before now that he knew what it was like to fall asleep with Keith.

 

\----  


They were close.

Almost two months after they started their journey, they made it to the Kuiper belt. If they used the Black Lion’s Super Speed the rest of the way, they’d be home in less than a day.

Lance was about to cry again. As soon as he set foot back on earth, he would kiss it. He didn’t care if he got dirt and other questionable substances in his mouth. He’d eat a cactus, too, just to demonstrate his love for earth.

“We should be there in about three vargas, if we can keep up this speed,” Coran announced over the comms. Lance was just glad that the Black Lion did most of the work, and the rest of the Lions just had to turn their thrusters on. Lance did so, then leaned back to relax. He closed his eyes, not intending to drift off but doing so anyways.

When he woke, it was to Voltron settling down on Earth’s surface. Lance immediately came to attention, looking around at the desert they had left so long ago. They disbanded Voltron and got all their things out, storing it in Keith’s old Conspiracy Theory Shack.

“I can’t believe it,” Krolia said, staring at the shack in awe with a box of stuff in her arms. Yura was busy winking in and out of sight, sniffing at all the earth plants. “I never thought I’d see this place again.”

Keith gave his mother a smile and took the box from her. “After I dropped out of the Garrison, I came back here,” he said. “It felt wrong at first, you know, with Dad being…”

Krolia nodded, not needing Keith to say anymore. Lance hastily hurried away with his box, not wanting to intrude any more than he already had.

The Paladins moved the Lions to Blue’s old hiding place, and Lance could sense his former Lion’s discomfort at being shoved back into her prison. He made sure to give her lots of love before he joined the others.

“Done canoodling with your Lion?” Keith asked.

Lance felt indignation spike up in him. “I wasn’t _canoodling_ -”

“Whatever,” Keith said, walking away. Lance watched him go, wondering what he did to piss off the black Paladin so much. He sighed before following him.

Lance looked around Keith’s little shack, watching everyone converse. Hunk and Pidge were busy building their robot still, and Romelle and Allura were conversing in Altean. Shiro was sitting on the couch, a dazed smile on his face as Coran talked away. Yura was sitting at Shiro’s feet. Krolia was showing Keith around his own shack, which Lance found kind of endearing.

Until he remembered his own mother, and then he found it ridiculously sad.

“Lance?” Hunk called.

Lance rubbed the tears out of his eyes and offered Hunk a smile. “Yeah?”

“Are you okay?”

“I-” Lance paused. He had been about to say _I’m fine,_ but he didn’t feel like lying any longer. “I want to go home.”

Every conversation in the room stopped. Lance would’ve found it comedic if everyone didn’t turn their eyes to him, giving him pitying looks. He hated that. Even Romelle and Krolia were looking at him with those expressions.

“Lance-” Allura started, standing up to come over to him.

“No,” Lance cut her off. “You don’t need me. Once Shiro gets better, he can fly the Black Lion again. Keith can fly the Red. You’ll still have Voltron. What do you need me here for? I can’t do anything. I can’t help you build the new Castleship. I’ll just get in your way.”

No one said anything for a few painfully long seconds. Finally Shiro stood up, as if sensing that no one else was going to step up to the leader role. “Lance, we do need you.”

“Yeah? For what?”

Another agonizingly long pause. Lance let out a self-deprecating laugh, raising a hand to his eyes as if he could shove the tears back in.

“I want to go home,” he repeated as he walked down the dark hallway to the room he was staying in. “I want to go home.”

 

\----  


Everyone was fragile with him after that. Hunk and Pidge always spoke to him in quiet voice now, and Pidge seemed to be avoiding him altogether when Matt and Dr. Holt arrived with the new Castleship plans. Lance didn’t know if it was because she felt bad that she had her family there with her and he didn't, but he wished she would stop.

He hammered uselessly at a metal plate with a wrench. They had started the construction of the Castleship as soon as Matt and Dr. Holt arrived, and so far they were about 1% done.

“Paladins and friends, please gather around,” Allura announced. “We have something to discuss.”

Lance set down his wrench and stood next to Hunk, leaning against his larger friend. Hunk didn’t seem to mind, just giving Lance a smile.

“I talked to Shiro, Dr. Holt, and Coran,” Allura began. Lance didn’t know why this was such a big deal; she talked to them everyday. “If we keep up this rate, the new Castleship should be ready in half a deca-phoebe. However, we all agree that we’d be able to manage just fine without a member.”

“So you’re saying that if one of us dies, we’d be fine,” Lance said, waving his wrench around. “Fantastic. Thanks for that inspiring speech.”

Hunk shoved his elbow into Lance’s side, very nearly causing him to fall over.

“Hey, watch it!”

“Did you even pay attention to what Allura said?” Hunk asked, crossing his arms.

“Yes, she said that we could manage without a member- oh!”

Lance couldn’t help the smile that broke across his face. He glanced between Allura and Coran and Shiro and back again, not sure he was hearing that quite right. “You mean…?”

Allura gave him a smile as she nodded. “Yes, Lance. You can go home.”

If you asked Lance, he would say he didn’t cry at all. If you asked anyone else, they would say he laid on the ground and bawled his eyes out.

“Lance? I thought you’d be glad about this! Why are you crying? Is something wrong?” Allura asked, her voice slightly distressed.

“Nothing’s wrong,” Lance said. “I’m just happy.”

 

\----  


The next day, Lance found himself in front of a spaceship Krolia stole from the Galaxy Garrison. All his stuff was packed and loaded, and all that was left were the goodbyes. Everyone hugged him one by one. Coran’s and Hunk’s were the most heartfelt, and Lance was almost soaked with tears by the time they moved on. Shiro’s hug was awkward with one arm, but it was welcome all the same. Romelle’s was brief. Krolia and Dr. Holt gave him a pat on the back and wished him luck. Yura licked his knee. Matt gave him the biggest hug after Hunk, which was surprising, and Pidge just hit him before burying her face in his chest.

“You’ll come back?” she asked, her glasses askew and eyes shining with tears.

“I will,” he said, though he didn’t know if he would.

Allura gave him a long hug. Two months earlier, Lance would’ve been ecstatic about this. Now, he just felt like he was getting hugged by his sister. He sighed into her bunches of fluffy white hair, pulling her close.

“Do you want us to come get you when we head back into space?” she asked, her blue eyes sparkling.

Lance shrugged. “Find me, if only it’s to say goodbye,” he murmured into her hair so only she could hear. She nodded against his shoulder before stepping away.

Keith was the last one to say farewell. He wasn’t wearing his trademark red jacket; it didn’t fit him anymore, not since he grew so much while he was on the weird star whale. Now he was wearing a black hoodie with black jeans and black combat boots, along with his black fingerless gloves. He really had no variety in his closet. The others stepped away, talking amongst themselves to give them a semblance of privacy. Lance appreciate it, though it was unnecessary. He and Keith only got along two days out of the year, and those two days already passed.

They stood awkwardly in front of each other, and Lance started backing up slowly.

“I-” Keith started before he abruptly stopped. “I’m- I’ll- I- just take care of yourself.”

Lance raised an eyebrow at him. “Yeah, you too, man.”

Keith nodded rapidly before he very nearly ran away.

Lance climbed into the spaceship, smiling and waving at everyone one last time. He had come to love everyone there, even Romelle and Yura. Krolia, too. Keith was the hardest to say goodbye to, and he gave Lance a flimsy wave before he ducked his head, his hair falling into his face and hiding him.

Lance wondered what could’ve been if he stayed, and then he went home.

 

\----  


He arrives in Varadero late at night. He lands his pod near the mountains, in a cave so no one will find it. Then he climbs down, the way home still engraved in his mind even after being away for so long.

Crickets are chirping, and a few cicadas are buzzing. White ginger flowers brush against his legs as he walks. He’s getting closer to home, he knows, because he and his brothers and sister used to walk this path to the market every Sunday.

There are a few old women out. He greets them in Spanish, his mother language feeling foreign on his tongue after ages of not using it. They stare at him incredulously before their wrinkled faces break out into large grins. _Lance, mijo_ ? _Has venido a casa! Te estabamos esperando!_

_Lance? You’ve come home! We were waiting for you!_

_Yes. I’ve come home._

He waves at them before he walks the worn dirt path to his home. He used to run up and down these streets with no shoes on, his feet getting dirty and rocks lodging themselves between his toes. His mother owned a ranch, so they lived on a road away from the main part of the city. It was always fun to walk down to the market with baskets of fruit balanced on their heads. Veronica, Lance’s youngest sibling, could never quite get the hang of it so there was always mangoes spilled on their little path. Their mother would scold them for dropping the fruit, and then she’d bring the spilled fruit inside and wash it off so the kids could eat it later.

Lance smiled fondly at the memory, watching the tall grass sway gently in the breeze. It’s been too long since he’s been here.

He comes to the large gate to their ranch. They own a few cows and chickens, so they always had to keep the gate closed so they wouldn’t escape. There was one time when Luis accidentally left the gate open so he, Lance, and Marco had to go searching for their cows all day. They eventually found them by the river where they swam every Sunday after they went to the market.

Lance pushes open the gate, making sure to latch it behind him. There is another pathway winding through their many flowers, little stones to mark the path. There’s a hammock nestled among the honeysuckle, against the fence. Lance doesn’t remember that being there.

Their house is more Mexican style than Cuban. It’s made out of clay, and the paint is faded and peeling. There are only three walls, leaving the entire back of the house exposed to the jungle. The veranda has more hammocks and a few rocking chairs, along with some candles that they light during the night to keep the mosquitos away. They aren’t lit now.

Lance follows the path through the garden, stopping in front of the door.

 _His_ door.

He knocks.

There is a moment of silence, and then he can hear cursing and shuffling from inside the house. He can hear his mother asking who the hell has the nerve to come to her house at midnight, and he smiles. He missed her.

She flings open the door, still cursing. “Don’t you know what time it is? Go away, and don’t come back tomorrow- _ay, dios mio_.”

As soon as she recognizes Lance, she bursts into tears, tugging him into a hug. He clings to her like his life depends on it. The commotion wakes his sister, who comes shuffling out onto the veranda with a yawn.

“Mama?” she asks. “Who is it?”

Lance pulls away from his mom long enough to smile at Veronica, who gasps and runs back into their house. No more than a minute later, Luis and Marco are standing outside with them.

Marco smiles at him, tugging him out of their mother’s grasp so he can hug him. “It’s good to see you again, little brother.”

Lance smiles and shoves him away. “You, too.”

Luis punches him. “You’ve got a lot of explaining to do,” he says.

“ _Si_ ,” their mother agrees with a watery smile. “ _Pero primero_ , we drink cocoa.”

Lances follows his family into the kitchen, where he and his sibling talk while his mother prepares special Cuban cocoa. She sets down a cup in front of all of them.

He’s home.

Lance tells them everything.

 

\----  


The next day is Sunday.

Veronica enters Lance’s room, a basket of fruit perfectly balanced on her head. “Wake up. Today is market day.”

Lance groans and rolls over. They hadn’t touched his room at all since he left, so there is a healthy coating of dust on everything. Including his bed. He sneezes and gets up. “Okay, fine.”

Luis and Marco are bickering about something when Lance enters. They’re both more than old enough to be moved out by now, so Lance doesn’t know why they’re still here.

“Hey, he’s awake! Finally! Let’s go to the market, already,” Marco says. “Marisol is going to be dancing there today.”

Lance frowns, turning to Veronica, who rolls her eyes. “Marisol is his girlfriend,” she explains.

Lance nods his understanding. There’s so much he missed while he was gone. “Okay,” he says. “Let me just get my shoes on.”

Everyone turns to stare at him. “Shoes, Lance? Come on. Only the elderly wear shoes,” Luis tells him. He picks up a basket of mangoes and hands it to him.

He smiles sheepishly, following his siblings out the door with a basket of fruit balanced on his head. His toes curl in the grass, and little pebbles get lodged between his toes.

  
\----

 

Months pass. It’s summer now, mid July. Lance spends most of his time with his family. His _tios_ and _tias_ and _sobrinos_ and _sobrinas_ and _primos_ are all excited to see him, and they have a week long Welcome Home party.

Lance loves every second of it. He still has nightmares, and he can never stop thinking of Keith, but sometimes he pretends that the Galaxy Garrison never happened and that Voltron was made up.

He knows it’s not true, but sometimes it helps when he hallucinates his friends.

There are some nights where he pretends Keith is in the bed with him if only to get him to fall asleep easier, and the next morning he wakes up feeling guilty and sad. He hopes Keith is happy, wherever he is.

He wishes he could see Keith again, but he doesn’t hope. Hope is a useless thing when you don’t know how long you’ll be hoping for.

Lance closes his eyes, swaying in his hammock. He asked his mother about it, and she said that she put it up when he left for the Garrison because she knew how much he liked laying among the honeysuckle flowers. He didn’t cry, nope.

The sweet scent of flowers drifts over him, and he sighs contentedly. Soft petals brush against his legs, and his toes kick at the dirt to get the hammock to swing.

“Lance, there’s a boy here who’s looking for you,” someone says, and Lance recognizes it as Veronica.

“Tell him I’m taken.”

Veronica smacks her lips. She’s been getting sassy now that she’s almost fifteen. In a few months, she’ll be having a quinceanera. “I would, but we all know you’re not."

“That’s not true,” Lance says, annoyed that Veronica is so sure he is single. “I could have a secret boyfriend or girlfriend that you don’t know about.”

“Lance.”

Lance nearly falls out of his hammock, his eyes flying wide open. There, standing on the path to his house with shoes on, is Keith.

“What are you doing here?”

Keith’s wary eyes slide over to Veronica.

“She knows,” Lance tells him. “About everything.”

Veronica sighs heavily. “I guess this is one of your space friends,” she says. “Guess I’ll leave you to it, then. Have fun with your _boyfriend,_ ” she walks up the steps to the veranda and disappears inside the house, her hips swaying at she goes. Lance cusses at her.

“What did she say?” Keith asks.

Lance turns back to Keith. He forgot that not everyone can speak Spanish, and Veronica only knows a little bit of English. “Nothing important,” he says, laying back down on his hammock. The scent of flowers is nonexistent now, with Keith being so close. His presence erases all else in Lance’s mind. “Why are you here? Where are the others?”

“The new Castleship is fully built,” Keith says. “We’re preparing to go back to space. The others are orbiting the moon right now. They sent me down here to see if you wanted to come back with us.”

Lance feels like he can’t breathe. He’s come home, only to have it be yanked away so soon. He doesn’t know if he should stay with his earth family or go with his space family. If he stays, then he might not ever see Keith again. If he goes, then he might not ever see his mom or siblings again.

He doesn’t know what to do.

“I don’t know,” Lance says.

Keith shuffles his feet. “If you want to stay, you should-”

“Stay,” Lance says. Keith freezes, his eyes flying open with a mixture of surprise and sadness. “ _You_ could stay.”

Keith’s eyes go back to a normal size. “Me? Here? With you?”

“Yeah,” Lance says, and he knows this a terrible, horrible, awful idea. “Stay with me for a week, and then I’ll make up my mind.”

“Okay,” says Keith. “Okay.”

  
\----

 

Lance lays on one of the hammocks on the veranda, Keith leaning against him. Veronica is sitting on the ledge, her legs swinging. Marco is with Marisol and Luis is with his friends, so it’s only the three of them. His mother is making cocoa inside.

His mother was enamored with Keith at first sight, cooing over him and treating him like he was her son. Of course, she knew why Keith was there, and Lance told her, but she didn’t treat Keith any differently. Lance loves her for that.

She comes out with four cups of cocoa in her hands. She hands one to each of the kids before she settles down into a rocking chair. She sighs contentedly.

“Lance,” she says. Lance turns to look at her, ceasing his staring at Keith. She smiles. “He’s a good boy,” she says in Spanish. “He will take care of you. If you want to go back, you should. I know you always valued the lives of others above your own, and this way you can put that to good use.”

Lance swallows the lump in his throat, but it did nothing. Tears push at his eyes, threatening to spill out. “Mama-”

“I am not finished. I think we both know that you’d have gone at the end of the week anyway. This way, you can go and not feel guilty about it. Just know that we will be here waiting for you when you come back,” she pauses, switching to English with a smile. “And you better come back soon, _entiende_?”

“ _Si,_ ” Lance says. Keith looks up at him, his eyes shining under the light of the mosquito candles.

Veronica is crying on her ledge, but she smiles at Lance. “I’ll miss you,” she says. “Bring me back some cool space rocks.”

He smiles at her. “Of course.”

His mother stands up and stretches. “Well,” she announces, “I am going to bed. Veronica, come.”

“But I’m not tired-”

“ _Vengase aca !”_

“ _Si!”_

His sister and mother disappear inside their home, leaving Keith and Lance outside by themselves.

Keith shuffles, pushing his back against Lance. “They’re nice,” he murmurs. “I like them.”

“Yeah,” Lance agrees. He's glad Keith now has a mother to experience all these kinds of things with. “I like them too.”

  
\----

 

Their legs are tangled up, and the sheets tangled around their legs. Lance feels like he’s floating.

Keith presses closer to Lance, their arms touching and body heat mingling. Lance closes his eyes, trying to steady his breathing.

“You look different,” Keith whispers after some time.

“Bad different?” Lance asks.

“Good different,” Keith says.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

  
\----  


It’s time to leave.

Lance is packed and prepared for a long trip into space this time, so he has more than a single outfit. He also brings his blanket and pillow pet, just for good luck.

His mother hands him a rather large bag of tamales and stuff to make cocoa. He knows Hunk will enjoy those.

Marco gives him a hug. He’s moving in with Marisol, so it’s unlikely that Lance will see him first thing when he returns. He gives Lance a bobblehead turtle from the market.

Luis comes next. He also gives Lance a hug, smiling at him and ruffling his hair. “I’ll see you later, _hermano_.”

“Yeah, yeah, later,” Lance says.

Next is Veronica. She sobs into Lance’s chest, her long black hair like ribbons around her face. “Don’t go,” she pleads. It makes Lance’s heart ache. “I’m going to miss you.”

“Just sleep until I come back,” Lance says, and she nods.

Last is his mother. She’s crying, but also smiling. Her graying hair is pulled up into a bun, and Lance is afraid that by the time he comes back her hair will be fully gray. She pulls him into a hug, kissing his forehead. “Be good, _mijo_ ,” she tells him.

“Of course,” he tells her.

She turns to Keith. “You. Take good care of my son.”

Keith stands up straighter. He looks like he’s about to salute Lance’s mom. To Lance’s relief and disappointment, he doesn’t. “I will.”

“Wait, Keith, get a picture of us,” Lance says. One last picture of his family.

Keith smiles and takes Lance’s phone, holding it up to take a picture. Veronica mutters something about being too ugly for a picture, but Lance ignores her.

He says a final farewell to his family, walking down the pathway with his shoes on.

  
\----

 

Keith and Lance take the Black Lion back to the new Castleship. Lance watches earth get smaller and smaller, the pang of homesickness already lodging itself in his heart.

He turns to Keith, who is busy flying the Lion. After a couple more seconds, Keith puts it in autopilot. He offers Lance a smile.

Lance smiles back. Even if he left his family on earth, he’s got a family right here. He won’t let anything happen to it.  

He takes Keith’s helmet off, kissing him as the light fades.


End file.
